The Dawn Chapel
is the general name for a collection of short stories. It sits somewhere in a no-man's-land between the gag-a-day strip and the longform comic. Short form, maybe? Middleform? What this effectively means for you if you're a reader is that if you don't like what you're reading, you can still just keep on reading, because in a few pages you'll be reading something else.
It's inspired to some extent by the Flight anthologies, both in the flavor of fantasy-adventure stories presented and in the short story anthology presentation. There is not, at present, any significance to the title The Dawn Chapel, nor does it refer to anything in any of the stories.
The current story, "The Way Back", is the longest comic in the collection, at 25+ strips and counting. Most of the examples below will refer to it.
The Dawn Chapel provides examples of:
- Animal Stereotypes: The Apex Predator series involves a proud lion coping with a series of household affronts to his dignity.
- Bunny-Ears Lawyer: Razzleback the jackelope is a good quartermaster and cook, but has a tendency to get theatrical and ramble about pirates.
- Don't Call Me "Sir": Noe asks that Pedro not call him "sir".
- Downer Ending: The conclusion of They Sit So Still. Most of the story is kind of a downer, honestly.
- Enemy Rising Behind: Pedro, intimidated by the captain, doesn't notice the vampire squid crawling over the railing.
- Fisher Kingdom: Some of the island worlds can inflict unwanted changes on visitors; this is what makes them so dangerous.
- Flying Seafood Special: Vampire squids, which are actually quite harmless.
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Schedule Slip: Suffered a bad one around May 2012, lasting until just before 2014. - Sleepy Head: Pedro falls asleep just before and after the captains' briefing; whether this is part of his personality or just a specific instance is yet to be seen.
